Wednesday, November 08, 2006

First, Karen (our adoption coach) and the teacher worked together to surprise Sandra (also from our adoption agency and in the class). The teacher came in a wrote some text on the board in Chinese characters and in Pinyin. As the class began, the teacher began to have us repeat some of the familiar words in the sentence such as China , leaving, she, date, 24 … and then she turned to Sandra who immediately got it that it was her travel date! It was so exciting and amazing to participate in such an amazing surprise! Congratulations Sandra!!

Then, as planned, the teacher proceeded to teach us how to make traditional Chinese dumplings. We all got to make about 3 dumplings each and we boiled them in water in an electric wok. Then we got to eat them which was the best part. Karen brought an amazing peanut sauce for dipping and we all had a feast. The recipe is quite easy, you buy the wrappers already made and the filling is: lean ground beef, minced onion, shredded carrot, shredded cabbage, soya sauce, vegetable oil and S&P. (There are many different types of fillings – she just chose this one to share with us) You put a teaspoon of the filling on the wrapper, wet all around the wrapper, pinch the opposite sides together, then pinch the sides in 3 pleats each (easier said than done – lol!) The trick is to seal it well so that the filling doesn’t come out during the boiling process. Boil or fry then serve! Yum!

After the dumplings, we got to partake in a traditional tea ceremony which was really fascinating! We learned about the different steps, the washing, the steeping, the pouring, the smelling. I really had a wonderful time!

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Hi, I'm Julie (creative, verbose, chocaholic) married to Stephan (aka: Hockey Dad). We have 2 great kids through adoption; Francis b: 29/01/01 adopted from Kemerovo, Russia in 2002 and Naomi b: 21/10/06 adopted from Guizhou, China in 2007.This blog started out as our journey to our daughter but has morphed into a blog about our life as a family.